CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



185 



ordered to be printed. Pending the motion 

 for the engrossment and third reading, Mr. 

 Shellabarger entered a motion to recommit the 

 bill. 



" I enter, Mr. Speaker, upon the considera- 

 tion of this measure with unfeigned reluctance. 

 The measure is one, sir, which does affect the 

 foundations of the Government itself, which 

 goes to every part of it, and touches the liber- 

 ties and the rights of all the people, and doubt- 

 less the destinies of the Union. And more than 

 that, Mr. Speaker, it involves questions of con- 

 stitutional law of importance absolutely vital. 

 And more still, there is a domain of constitu- 

 tional law involved in the right consideration 

 of this measure which is wholly unexplored. 

 We enter upon it now for the first time in the 

 history of the Government. And he would 

 have an inadequate comprehension of the mag- 

 nitude of the debate upon which we now enter 

 who did not enter upon it with extreme hesi- 

 tation, doubt, and misgiving, as to his ability to 

 thoroughly explore and consider the questions 

 we approach. 



"I shall confine myself to a consideration of 

 the qualities of this bill, its relations to the 

 Constitution, our power to enact it, and, if I 

 have time, the justness and wisdom of the 

 measure. 



" In the first section of this bill it is pro- 

 vided 



That any person who, under color of any law, 

 statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage or 

 any State, shall subject, or cause to be subjected, 

 any person within the jurisdiction of the United 

 States to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, 

 or immunities to which, as such citizen, he is en- 

 titled under the Constitution or laws of the United 

 States, shall, any such law, statute, ordinance, regu- 

 lation, custom, or usage of the State to the contrary 

 notwithstanding, be liable to the party injured in an 

 action at law, suit in equity, or other proper pro- 

 ceeding for redress ; such proceeding to be prose- 

 cuted in the several district or circuit courts of the 

 United States, etc. 



"My first inquiry is as to the warrant which 

 we have for enacting such a section as this. 

 The model for it will be found in the second 

 section of the act of April 9, 1866, known as 

 the 'civil rights act.' That section provides 

 a criminal proceeding in identically the same 

 case as this one provides a civil remedy for, 

 except that the deprivation under color of State 

 law must, under the civil rights act, have been 

 on account of race, color, or former slavery. 

 This section of this bill, on the same state of 

 facts, not only provides a civil remedy for per- 

 sons whose former condition may have been 

 that of slaves, but also to all people where, 

 under color of State law, they, or any of them, 

 may be deprived of rights to which they are 

 entitled under the Constitution by reason and 

 virtue of their national citizenship. 



" The first inquiry, then, is naturally where 

 is the constitutional authority, or, if you please, 

 where is the constitutional impediment author- 

 izing or preventing such legislation ? It is ab- 

 solutely plain that, if it was constitutional to 



pass the second section of the civil rights bill, 

 then it is equally competent to pass into law 

 this first section of this bill. Why do I say that ? 

 Because the same exact right is involved in 

 each case. The constitutional right upon which 

 it was competent to enact the second section 

 of the civil rights bill was this : tbe civil rights 

 bill was passed to enforce the provisions of the 

 thirteenth article of amendments to the Con- 

 stitution of the United States was passed in 

 virtue of the two provisions of that thirteenth 

 amendment, one of which reversed and over- 

 threw the State constitutions creating slavery 

 and prohibited the States from ' denying ' the 

 slaves citizenship, turned them into citizens ; 

 and the other, being the second section of that 

 amendment, gave Congress power to enforce 

 this first provision by * appropriate legisla- 

 tion ; ' or, in other words, to enforce the rights 

 of citizenship to which the slave was admitted 

 by the act of his emancipation. 



" That act, and I need not delay longer upon 

 it, has already passed under tbe review of the 

 Supreme Courts of at least three States of this 

 Union, and I do not know of how many more ; 

 also under review of the Circuit Court of the 

 United States of the district of Kentucky, 

 Justice Swayne, in his opinion in that last- 

 named case, ah opinion exceedingly elaborate, 

 exceedingly exhaustive, exceedingly able, sums 

 up his conclusions by saying, 'We have no 

 doubt of the constitutionality of every provision 

 of this act.' 



" The exact legal effect of these decisions, 

 sustaining the constitutionality of the civil 

 rights bill, is to declare that the result of two 

 constitutional provisions, one saying that the 

 States shall not make citizens slaves, and the 

 other saying that Congress may, by appropri- 

 ate legislation, enforce the first provision, is 

 to authorize Congress to define and punish as 

 a crime against the United States any act of 

 deprivation of the rights of the newly-made 

 American citizenship. That is the point, effect, 

 and result, precisely of these adjudications. If 

 that is law, then that is the end of the discus- 

 sion as to the right of Congress to pass this 

 first section, because, surely, if the thirteenth 

 amendment did so much as this, the far more 

 explicit, complete, and careful provisions of 

 the fourteenth much more did it by declaring 

 all our people United States citizens ; declaring 

 that no State shall make or enforce any law 

 abridging their privileges or immunities as 

 such ; declaring that the States shall not deny 

 them equal protection of these equal laws, and 

 then declaring that Congress shall have power, 

 by appropriate legislation, to enforce the en- 

 joyment of tbese privileges of citizenship by 

 seeing to it that the laws do not abridge them 

 nor tbe States withhold protection to them. 



" Then, Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt, there 

 can be no rational doubt, of the right to enact 

 the first section of this bill, provided tbe civil 

 rights bill and the adjudications under that bill 

 in the several States and in the Circuit Court 



